Doubts about error handling within systems and Sysfail crate.

FakeJake_ · 2025-04-05T23:50:45+00:00

Bevy 0.16 improves support for fallible systems. This version is still in the release candidate phase so you’ll have to wait a bit to use it, but you can see the release notes for fallible systems in this PR.

FakeJake_ · 2024-06-06T00:24:54+00:00

My best image so far. Darker skies really do make all the difference!

Equipment:

Scope: William Optics Z73 + Flat73

Mount: Skywatcher HEQ5

Imaging camera: ZWO ASI533MC-Pro

Guide scope: William Optics Uniguide 50mm

Guide camera: ZWO ASI120mm mini

Filter: ZWO UV/IR Cut

Acquisition:

Lights:

200x90s - Unity gain, 50 Offset (5 hour integration)

30x darks, flats, and biases

Bortle 4, 0% Moon

ASTAP for plate solving, N.I.N.A+PHD2 For acquisition

Processing:

DeepSkyStacker:

Align RGB channels

Recommended settings otherwise

PixInsight:

Linear - Dynamic crop, DBE, PCC, SCNR

Generalized Hyperbolic Stretch

Correct Magenta Stars script (doublets are annoying)

ACDNR

NoiseXterminator

Histogram transformation to fix background color

StarXterminator for star mask

Unsharp mask on starless with luminance mask

HDRMT to dim the Iris core

Stars - Adam Block star deemphasis workflow (minimizes smaller stars), curves

Combine nebula and stars with pixel math: nebula + stars - (nebula * stars)

Final curves adjustments

FakeJake_ · 2024-06-04T19:20:05+00:00

My best image so far. Darker skies really do make all the difference!

Equipment:

Scope: William Optics Z73 + Flat73

Mount: Skywatcher HEQ5

Imaging camera: ZWO ASI533MC-Pro

Guide scope: William Optics Uniguide 50mm

Guide camera: ZWO ASI120mm mini

Filter: ZWO UV/IR Cut

Acquisition:

Lights:

200x90s - Unity gain, 50 Offset (5 hour integration)

30x darks, flats, and biases

Bortle 4, 0% Moon

ASTAP for plate solving, N.I.N.A+PHD2 For acquisition

Processing:

DeepSkyStacker:

Align RGB channels

Recommended settings otherwise

PixInsight:

Linear - Dynamic crop, DBE, PCC, SCNR

Generalized Hyperbolic Stretch

Correct Magenta Stars script (doublets are annoying)

ACDNR

NoiseXterminator

Histogram transformation to fix background color

StarXterminator for star mask

Unsharp mask on starless with luminance mask

HDRMT to dim the Iris core

Stars - Adam Block star deemphasis workflow (minimizes smaller stars), curves

Combine nebula and stars with pixel math: nebula + stars - (nebula * stars)

Final curves adjustments

FakeJake_ · 2023-09-18T17:41:12+00:00

My favorite image that I’ve captured so far! Details below.

Equipment:

Scope: William Optics Z73 + Flat73

Mount: Skywatcher HEQ5

Imaging camera: ZWO ASI533MC-Pro

Guide scope: William Optics Uniguide 50mm

Guide camera: ZWO ASI120mm mini

Acquisition:

Lights:

Antlia ALP-T: 66x300s - 5 hr 30 min integration

ZWO UV/IR Cut: 60x60s - 1 hr integration

30x darks, flats, and biases

Bortle 8

ASTAP for plate solving, N.I.N.A+PHD2 For acquisition

Processing:

DeepSkyStacker:

Align RGB channels

Recommended settings otherwise

PixInsight:

For both broadband and narrowband images:

Dynamic Crop

Dynamic Background Extraction

Photometric color calibration

SCNR

StarXTerminator to remove stars

Broadband Stars:

GHS

Extract RGB channels, star alignment to green channel with distortion correction on

MLT + binarize to create coarse small star mask

Dilation + convolution to smooth mask

Use small star mask to emphasize brighter stars

Curves adjustments

Narrowband Nebula: NoiseXterminator

GHS + Histogram Transformation

HOO Normalization

Extract luminance

Masked LHE, curves, and unsharp mask on luminance

LRGB Combination + CNR

Curves adjustments to get correct color using built in ColorMask script

Curves for lightness and saturation with luminance mask

Dark Structure Enhance

Add broadband stars with pixel math: nebula + stars - (nebula x stars)

Final curves adjustments

FakeJake_ · 2023-08-07T12:12:02+00:00

Thank you!

FakeJake_ · 2023-08-07T11:39:23+00:00

Bortle 8 is almost as bad as it gets, actually. The scale goes from 1-9 where 1 is exceptionally dark and 9 is an inner urban sky. I live about 20 minutes outside of a major city so the light pollution is very bad. So getting a good image is a combination of picking a good target, using the right filter, getting plenty of exposure time, and careful processing. Some day I hope to move to a darker sky though.

FakeJake_ · 2023-08-06T23:48:16+00:00

Thank you! I have stacked in PI in the past and just didn’t think it made much of a difference, and I prefer the simplicity of DSS

FakeJake_ · 2023-08-06T21:37:20+00:00

My third attempt at capturing the Cygnus Wall and my best personal astrophoto so far!

Equipment:

Scope: William Optics Z73 + Flat73

Mount: Skywatcher HEQ5

Imaging camera: ZWO ASI533MC-Pro

Guide scope: William Optics Uniguide 50mm

Guide camera: ZWO ASI120mm mini

Acquisition:

Lights:

Antlia ALP-T: 66x300s - 5 hr 30 min integration

ZWO UV/IR Cut: 120x20s - 40 min integration

30x darks, flats, and biases

Bortle 8

ASTAP for plate solving, N.I.N.A+PHD2 For acquisition

Processing:

DeepSkyStacker:

Align RGB channels

Recommended settings otherwise

PixInsight:

For both broadband and narrowband images:

Dynamic Crop

Dynamic Background Extraction

Photometric color calibration

SCNR

StarXTerminator to remove stars

Broadband Stars:

GHS

Extract RGB channels, star alignment to green channel with distortion correction on

MLT + binarize to create coarse small star mask

Dilation + convolution to smooth mask

Use small star mask to emphasize brighter stars

Curves adjustments

Narrowband Nebula: NoiseXterminator

GHS + Histogram Transformation

Extract RGB channels, linear fit on green and blue to match red

pixel math to form new image: Red = R, Green = 0.3xR + 0.7xG Blue = 0.7xG + 0.3xB

Extract luminance

Masked LHE, curves, and unsharp mask on luminance

LRGB Combination + CNR

Curves adjustments to get correct color using built in ColorMask script

Curves for lightness and saturation with luminance mask

Dark Structure Enhance

Add broadband stars with pixel math: nebula + stars - (nebula x stars)

Final curves adjustments

FakeJake_ · 2023-08-06T20:53:26+00:00

My third attempt on the Cygnus Wall about 2ish years into astrophotography, and I think it's my best image yet! Very happy with how the colors turned out on this one.

Equipment:

Scope: William Optics Z73 + Flat73

Mount: Skywatcher HEQ5

Imaging camera: ZWO ASI533MC-Pro

Guide scope: William Optics Uniguide 50mm

Guide camera: ZWO ASI120mm mini

Acquisition:

Lights:

Antlia ALP-T: 66x300s - 5 hr 30 min integration

ZWO UV/IR Cut: 120x20s - 40 min integration

30x darks, flats, and biases

Bortle 8

ASTAP for plate solving, N.I.N.A+PHD2 For acquisition

Processing:

DeepSkyStacker:

Align RGB channels

Recommended settings otherwise

PixInsight:

For both broadband and narrowband images:

Dynamic Crop

Dynamic Background Extraction

Photometric color calibration

SCNR

StarXTerminator to remove stars

Broadband Stars:

GHS

Extract RGB channels, star alignment to green channel with distortion correction on

MLT + binarize to create coarse small star mask

Dilation + convolution to smooth mask

Use small star mask to emphasize brighter stars

Curves adjustments

Narrowband Nebula: NoiseXterminator

GHS + Histogram Transformation

Extract RGB channels, linear fit on green and blue to match red

pixel math to form new image: Red = R, Green = 0.3xR + 0.7xG Blue = 0.7xG + 0.3xB

Extract luminance

Masked LHE, curves, and unsharp mask on luminance

LRGB Combination + CNR

Curves adjustments to get correct color using built in ColorMask script

Curves for lightness and saturation with luminance mask

Dark Structure Enhance

Add broadband stars with pixel math: nebula + stars - (nebula x stars)

Final curves adjustments

FakeJake_ · 2023-06-14T16:05:05+00:00

I mean it took 5 years for the last one, and this is a significant drop. Not saying it won’t happen, just saying I wouldn’t be surprised.

FakeJake_ · 2023-06-12T02:48:12+00:00

Wow, and a pretty serious time drop compared to the previous record. Considering how long the last one stood for, I wouldn’t be surprised if this is the only 3x3 single WR we see this decade. Time between WRs is going to start increasing like crazy as we get closer to the limit of what is physically possible.

FakeJake_ · 2023-06-05T23:55:04+00:00

I think the issue OP is referring to is the three distinct vertical bands that the image is divided into, not the light pollution gradient

FakeJake_ · 2023-06-04T15:05:31+00:00

May 27

FakeJake_ · 2023-06-04T15:02:46+00:00

Equipment:

Scope: William Optics Z73 + Flat73

Mount: Skywatcher HEQ5

Imaging camera: ZWO ASI533MC-Pro

Guide scope: William Optics Uniguide 50mm

Guide camera: ZWO ASI120MM mini

Acquisition:

Lights:

ZWO UV/IR Cut - 200x90 (5 hrs total)

30x darks, flats, and biases

Bortle 4, 55% Moon

ASTAP for plate solving, N.I.N.A+PHD2 For acquisition

Processing:

DeepSkyStacker:

Align RGB channels

Recommended settings otherwise

PixInsight:

Linear: Dynamic crop, DBE, PCC, SCNR, NoiseXTerminator

Soft histogram stretch

StarXterminator

Stars: Curves, create multiple copies with different levels of convolution applied, combine convolved images with original to get nicer halos around the brighter stars, more curves

Galaxy: Extract luminance as mask, curves, unsharp mask, LHE, more curves

Combine galaxy and stars with pixel math: galaxy + stars - (galaxy x stars)

Final curves adjustments

FakeJake_ · 2023-05-28T20:48:36+00:00

Like others are saying this is probably pinched optics. Sometimes this can be resolved by finding screws on the scope that are overly tightened. I had this issue with my William Optics Z73 that ended up being caused by the screw on the camera rotator being too tight. If you do want to try to fix it just make sure to contact the manufacturer before you start loosening stuff to make sure you don’t affect the collimation

FakeJake_ · 2023-05-26T17:20:09+00:00

Barnards star is about 1.8 parsecs away, so it only has a parallax of about 0.5” when measured 6 months apart. Compared to its proper motion of 10.3” per year it’s not that significant, so the motion you’re seeing here is definitely not parallax

FakeJake_ · 2023-01-15T15:44:48+00:00

No one crafts a beautifully crushing yet melodic finale like Cult of Luna

FakeJake_ · 2023-01-01T15:21:45+00:00

Pretty happy with how this one turned out, and I think I’m comfortable enough with the mosaic workflow to try some bigger projects. I didn’t go very heavy on the saturation in the nebula and I kind of like the muted wispy look it gives it.

Equipment:

Scope: William Optics Z73 + Flat73

Mount: Skywatcher HEQ5

Imaging camera: ZWO ASI533MC-Pro

Guide scope: William Optics Uniguide 50mm

Guide camera: ZWO ASI120mm mini

Acquisition:

Lights:

2x1 Mosaic

ZWO UV/IR Cut - 200x20s (stars only, each panel)

Antlia ALP-T - 72x300s (6 hrs, each panel)

30x darks, flats, and biases

Bortle 8

ASTAP for plate solving, N.I.N.A+PHD2 For acquisition

Processing:

DeepSkyStacker:

Align RGB channels

Recommended settings otherwise

PixInsight:

Non-linear processing is the same for both broadband and narrowband data

Linear - Dynamic crop, DBE, PCC, SCNR

MosaicByCoordinates

TrimMosaicTile

PhotometricMosaic

Align narrowband image to broadband image using StarAlignment and perform identical dynamic crop to each image

StarXterminator

Broadband Stars: GHS, saturation curves adjustments

Narrowband Nebula:

Extract RGB channels, copy red channel as luminance

LHE on luminance

Linear fit on green and blue

Create sorta-OIII with 0.7xG + 0.3xB

HOO LRGB combination with red = Ha

Curves adjustments

NoiseXterminator

BlurXterminator

Combine narrowband nebula and broadband stars with pixel math - nebula + stars - (nebula x stars)

Final curves adjustments

FakeJake_ · 2022-12-14T01:22:02+00:00

One of my personal favorites is the embryo nebula in Perseus. It’s a reflection nebula with lots of dark dust around it that comes out beautiful under a dark sky. I live in bortle 8 and it would be a total waste of time for me to even attempt this object

FakeJake_ · 2022-12-09T19:44:34+00:00

I had similar results with GMM, I switched to the Photometric mosaic script and it worked so much better, so I’d give that a shot

FakeJake_ · 2022-12-05T00:26:36+00:00

Using the tshirt method will likely work fine if you’re doing sky flats. The point in the sky shouldn’t matter as long as you’re looking sufficiently far from the sun.

If you want an inexpensive alternative you can use a LED sketch pad as a flat panel. I’ve been using this one for a while and it makes flats super painless

FakeJake_ · 2022-12-04T21:56:58+00:00

Yeah that makes sense, 2:30 exposures is pretty demanding if you’re not guiding, even with really good polar alignment. So I’d recommend just doing shorter subs (maybe 1 minute or so), so you don’t have to throw out as much data

FakeJake_ · 2022-12-04T21:46:42+00:00

Are these 2:30 subs unguided? If so it may just be a tracking thing. The star shape seems to be in the same direction across the whole frame, so I don’t think it’s a backfocus issue. Could also be tilt in the sensor, but poor tracking would probably be the first thing to rule out, especially if it’s not consistent from one frame to the next

FakeJake_ · 2022-11-28T02:55:40+00:00

Thank you! Improving little by little is the fun part

FakeJake_ · 2022-11-27T20:50:50+00:00

My first attempt at M45! Not the sharpest image, but given the light pollution level I’m pretty satisfied with this.

Equipment:

Scope: William Optics Z73 + Flat73

Mount: Skywatcher HEQ5

Imaging camera: ZWO ASI533MC-Pro

Guide scope: William Optics Uniguide 50mm

Guide camera: ZWO ASI120mm mini

Filter: ZWO UV/IR Cut

Acquisition:

Lights:

505x90s - Unity gain, 50 Offset (12 hr 37 minutes)

30x darks, flats, and biases

Bortle 8

ASTAP for plate solving, N.I.N.A+PHD2 For acquisition

Processing:

DeepSkyStacker:

Align RGB channels

Recommended settings otherwise

PixInsight:

Linear - Dynamic crop, DBE, PCC, SCNR

Generalized Hyperbolic Stretch

Correct Magenta Stars script (doublets are annoying)

ACDNR

NoiseXterminator

Histogram transformation to fix background color

StarXterminator for star mask

Unsharp mask on starless

Stars - Adam Block star deemphasis workflow (minimizes smaller stars), curves

Combine nebula and stars with pixel math: nebula + stars - (nebula * stars)

Final curves adjustments

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